Maddie is on a boat to see the lighthouse. She was given a pamphlet about the lighthouse on her ride over. The lighthouse is 80 meters tall. As the boat is getting closer and maddie can see the lighthouse from the boat. She calculates that the shadow of the lighthouse towering over the boat is 18 degrees. She wants to know how many meters away she is from the lighthouse though.
_______?_______
18 degrees
80 meters
Before they reach the light house maddie decides to sketch a right triangle on the back of her pamphlet. Side A represents the lighthouse, Side B represents the distance away and side C is the shadow of the lighthouse. The angle of C is 18 degrees.
_______?_______
18 degrees
80
??
18
Maddie decides to use sohcahtoa in order to figure out the distance of the boat to the lighthouse. She puts down tan (18) = 80/x. tan (18) is equal to .324 and then that time 80 is 26.
Maddie made it to the lighthouse after figuring out that she was 26 meters away from it.